I feel like a Grandmother telling you this

I’ve been a big vinegar fan most of my life. It’s really great on fries, like REALLY great, especially if it’s malt vinegar! But over the past few years, I’ve learned to love it for an entirely different reason; this stuff cleans like nothing else! I hate expensive, hazardous, smelly cleaners (even more now that I have a kid that puts everything in his mouth). The thought of using a harsh cleaner on any surface that he touches, let alone one that he bathes in or eats off of, makes my skin crawl…kinda like like what it would actually do to him! So, I buy vinegar, in bulk, and use it to clean just about everything. (Sidenote: we do have harsh cleaners in the house. Sometimes I don’t have several hours to let something soak, and sometimes using an antibacterial cleaner after raw chicken was on the counter, is a good idea).

So, go and google household vinegar uses, you’ll get lots of sites with huge lists, but here are some of my favourite ways to use it:

rinse agent in the dishwasher. This is by far my favourite use, and I sadly just discovered it a few weeks ago. Instead of buying that oh so expensive rinse agent (and ya know you gotta get the name brand one, cuz the others just don’t work), fill that little spot with vinegar. Your dishes have never been cleaner. Everything is so clear and sparkly, not a single water spot on any glasses, no hint of soap taste when you fill a glass with water. Super clean!

washing floors. I don’t like using cleaners to wash my ceramic tile floors. If you mix too much it leaves a film, if it’s too little it won’t even clean. Most of the stuff is so overly scented to cover up the chemical smell that you need to open all the window and air the entire house out (not ideal if you live in Canada and want clean floors in the winter!). 1 cup of vinegar with a bucket full of hot water, and everything is clean, and nothing smells of vinegar!

cleaning humidifier. We bought a cold humidifier for our sons’ bedroom. The instructions actually stated to use bleach once a week to clean out any calcium deposits that build up. Bleach?! Are you freaking kidding me! Sure, I’ll use bleach, but how many times am I going to have to rinse it to get it all off so that I’m not spraying bleach vapours into my kids room while he sleeps? Idiots! Vinegar works just fine, soak it for a few hours, and it wipes right off.

bottle sterilizer. Same goes for cleaning the sterilizer for the baby bottles, it says to use vinegar, but to run it with the vinegar in it, this makes the entire house smell of vinegar. Just let the vinegar sit in it for an hour, and the calcium deposits will wipe right off.